Plus, Bernie Sanders on the overnight vote to repeal obamacare. A time Elizabeth Warren and ben carson faced off at a confirmation hearing. Dr. Carson, im trying to ask a more pointed question. And surprising joe biden. I am pleased to award our nations highest civilian honor, the president ial medal of freedom. [ applause ] and exit interview with the Vice President when all in starts right now. Good evening from new york, im chris hayes, we are eight days from donald trump becoming president of the United States of america and once again tonight we are faced with an absolute deluge of major seismic and important news. We begin with a story dominating the National Conversation one in which we are finally perhaps starting to get more clarity. But it remains at this hour a story thaw is maddeningly hard to pin down despite the boundless stakes. I speak of the saga of the decision to include a twopage summariened briefing materials for president obama and the president elect trump of an infamous, dlashs, salacious dost the russian government has compromising material about the incoming president elect and trumps team and the russian government exchanged information during the president ial campaign. Multiple sources tell nbc news those materials wiere not presented to trump during the formal briefing but after ward james comey took trump aside and spoke with him one on one about the existence of the unverified allegations against him and told him a summary of those claims was included in an addendum to the topsecret report. Today Vice President joe biden said intelligence officials told him they felt obliged to inform the president and Vice President of the materials in part because they were concerned they would become public. Was it a mistake for the Intelligence Community to even include that unverified two paged addendum even included in the briefing papers. We asked that question and their argument was that this is something that the press already had. Not just here in the United States but other places. That it would be they would be they didnt use the word derelict but it was their obligation to inform not only us but the president elect that this was out there. So that it didnt come out 206 blue and have any impact on the conduct of our foreign policy. They were clear that they just mentioned it, they made no judgment about it, they did not say any of this was substantiated but they felt it was obliged. We will have much more of that exclusive interview later in the show. We now know the dossier was prepared initially at the behest of antitrump republicans by a former British Intelligence officer Christopher David steel who nbc news partner itv reports was posted to moscow in 1990 and who has now reportedly gone into hiding to avoid attention or possible retribution. Asked by nbc news if russian intelligence agencies on trump, a Vladimir Putin spokesman Dimitry Peskov pleaded ignorance. Have your intelligence agencies got anything on donald trump . Ive never seen the file. With respect, thats not a complete denial. I do not work in intelligence agencies. At his News Conference yesterday, trump said uncategorically the information in the dossier was false. Its a fake news. Its phony stuff. It didnt happen. And it was gotten by opponents of ours as you know because you reported it and so did many of the other people, it was a group of opponents that got together, sick people, and they put that crap together. Does anyone really believe that story . Im also very much of a germaphobe, by the way, believe me. Trump spoke on the phone yesterday with James Clapper, the director of National Intelligence who said he expressed his dismay to trump that the information had been leaked and he didnt believe the leak did not come he believed the leak did not come from the Intelligence Community. Trump tweeted today James Clapper called me yesterday to denounce the false and fictitious report that was illegally circulated. Made up phony facts. Too bad. But clapper is telling a different story. He is not deeming the information false as trump suggested but rather suggesting the Intelligence Community does not know if it is true or not. According to clapper the Intelligence Community has not made any judgment that the information in this document is reliable and we did not rely upon it in any way for our conclusions. However, part of our obligation is to ensure that policymakers are provided with the fullest possible picture of any matters that might affect national security. Included in that dossier was the potentially explosive claim the trump camp coordinated with the russians during the campaign. A claim trump Spokesman Sean Spicer today flatly denied on a phone call with reporters. The Trump Campaign and the russian government and any suggestion otherwise is totally irresponsible. Politics shouldnt play a role in our intelligence efforts and our intelligence efforts shouldnt play a role in our politics. And then there is this potential bombshell. The guardian citing unnamed sources reporting that the fbi applied for a warrant from t seet fisa court in order to monitor four members of the trump team but that the fisa court, which turns down very few applications, turned down the application asking fbi investigators to narrow down their focus. Another report from Election Night claims the fbi sought and was granted a fisa Court Warrant in october after narrowing the scope of its request. Nbc news has not confirmed the fisa court claims if. That is true it means while it was publicly discussing its politically damaging investigation of Hillary Clinton, the fbi was simultaneously investigating trumps team over possible ties to russia while managing to keep that investigation a total secret. Joining me now, New York Times political reporter and msnbc contributor nick confessore. This is such a bizarre story because at the center of it is a document which has now been made public whose charges are wyle you know, theyre massively scandalous, if true, but also whose truth content we have no ability to judge. Right and possibly no way of judging in the the future. So the important thing to realize is this began with a republican donor whos still a mystery, by the way, who wanted some information on trumps business ties in russia and other matters, commissioned as a kind of opposition process . Yeah. And commissioned a Research Firm in washington and theres a little subworld of Research Firms that do this, people have heard of oppo, this is high end oppo. It involves hiring private eyes. To be clear, this is not a 26yearold digging through a courthouse in florida. This is retired intelligence officials . Right. It can be. So that firm subcontracted out this man and assembled what he was told back into this dossier or into these report which is made their way back to the client. At some point, some democrats, people who were proclinton were involved in picking up the baton of either funding or seeing the documents. When the republican donor backed away because of trump being the nominee of the party. So from that point on stop right there. Trump says its a bunch of sick guys that got together. This was one individual that basically hired a firm that then subcontracted. How does that baton get passed . Like, hey, opportunity russian dossier . Its not entirely clear to me at some point the contents began to be circulated among reporters in washington a version of it was reported on by david corn of mother jones in october. Without the most sensational claims. Exactly. Some people had seen or heard about in the late july but as you pointed out, it was hard to verify the contents. To be clear, christopher steel, my sense from the reporting i have seen and people that work in intelligence, this is not how to put this this is not someone considered a kook or a nut or you know, anyone can be an exspy and they could lose their mind or whatever doesnt mean anything in there is true, but he is regarded with a degree of credibility. People regard him as real, but the question is is the intelligence real . Hes as good as his sources. You saw the report going around washington and reporters of various organizations couldnt run it down. So now we stand with is the incoming president a turned foreign asset or is he being libelled in one of the most egregious fashions ever . Shrug. And if its fiction its possible its also russian intelligence. Nikck confessore, thank you for your time. Appreciate it. Joining me now, congressman adam schiff, the Ranking Member of the house Intelligence Committee. The reason i wanted to talk to you is that you are one of only about a dozen people due to your position on that Intelligence Committee who gets to access the most highly classified briefings and you can never talk about what you see but i would love your guidance as we on the outside of this attempt to figure out what is going on, donald trump saying that there is a determination made about the intelligence contained in that dossier, director of National Intelligence saying there was none. What should we think . I would go with the director of National Intelligence. Unfortunately the president elect has demonstrated that you cant rely on what he says in his tweets and you cant rely on what he says in his press statements either and the best illustration of that was when the Intelligence Community released a public report about the russian hacking the Trump Organization put out a statement from the president elect saying that it showed there was no affect on the outcome of the election but, of course, thats not at all what the report said. In fact, that would be well beyond the scope of what the Intelligence Community can assess. Instead it said merely there was no tampering with the votecounting machines but plainly the daily dumping of documents targeting secretary clinton had an affect. We may never know whether it was determinative or not but clearly it had an affect so you couldnt rely on what the president elect said about the report. I dont think you can rely on what the president elect says about his conversation with director clapper and the directors statement made it very clear they have made no judgment on the reliability of those documents from that private security firm. One of the things director clapper did say in the beginning of that statement was expressing his frustration, anger, i believe about the leaks and i have to say, wouldnt you agree that it is fundamentally in some senses unfair to the reputation of the individual about to take the oath of office that theres now this kind of cloud of suspicion that hangs over him due in part to this leak . I think the director was exactly right. Not only to point out in his statement that these leaks are corrosive but to call the president elect and say that he does not believe this is the Intelligence Community that was responsible and that this is very damaging. Its obviously not only damaging in terms of the president elect and his reputation but also its damaging just to the trust between the president elect and Intelligence Community which started out at a low ebb but, you know, what concerns me the most, frankly, beyond reputation and beyond anything else frankly is what are the facts here . And who the going to investigate all of the aspects of russian interference in our Political Affairs . Because i think frankly the investigation ought to follow the facts wherever they lead and the russians have used a whole variety of tactics, everything from blackmail to extortion to the funding of extremist parties to europe to hacking to dumping to dumping of forged documents. I put nothing past the russians and we ought to have a bipartisan nonpartisan Commission Like 9 11 investigate this. Congressman adam schiff, as i said, Ranking Member on the house Intelligence Committee. Thanks for your time, appreciate it. Thank you. Joining me now, chris murphy of connecticut, member of the Senate Foreign relations committee. I want to first get your reaction to the first series of stories, the latest that it was james comey, we have sources saying, told the president elect about to contents of this twopage summary. I think it is appropriate for the fbi or intelligence to tell him about it given the fact it was likely going to be leaked. I agree with congressman schiff that these leaks are damaging. But lets be honest, everyones looking for a why here. Donald trump has invited much of this speculation upon himself because of this bizarre isolationism of his positioning on russia so far outside of 2 american mainstream, this constant apology for Vladimir Putin and his allies and his nominees in these confirmation hears who are basically lining up to withdraw the sanctions that have been put on russia over the last few years. Can i stop you there, though . I want you to respond to this. This sounds dangerously close to saying the following the ideological positions of the person who will be president of the United States are such that they invite questions about his loyalty and invite questions about whether he is a compromised asset of a foreign power. Thats not what im saying. I say they invite questions as to the motive, when someone is this far outside of the mainstream, when theres really no good explanation for why you would be seeking to cozy up to a vicious dictator who wishes us nothing but ill explanation. This is incredibly thinly sourced and theres nothing in it that would give us confidence this is, in fact, is the reason but you can understand why people are searching today because its hard to draw a line from his position on russia to a motive that we see in the open today. It does seem that something must be done in terms of further factfinding and some definitive accounting. At this point the current status quo seems completely untenable this thing is out there and were all just shrugging our shoulders. What can you in the senate do, what can members of congress to provide definitive judgment so the public the know where things stand . I think this is made more difficult by the questions that were asked of director comey earlier in the week. He has not been able to disclose whether he is conducting an investigation. That would certainly give people some confidence the truth to the extent we can know what will be made known but, frankly, congress over the years has been good at doing investigations. We havent done many recently but this would be something the Intelligence Committee, the Foreign Relations committee, a bipartisan multicommittee effort could look into. Somebody has to do this work. We wont know if its the fbi then i would counsel the chairs of the Foreign Relations committee, the Intelligence Committee to convene their own panel. Senator chris murphy, thanks for your time, appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Still to come, senator Bernie Sanders joins me tonight. Stick around for that. Next, the huge news today, a new investigation into the actions of the Justice Department, the fbi and comey for their handling of the clinton email probe leading up to the president ial election. Thats after this break. Americans 83 try to eat healthy. Yet up 90 fl short in getting key nutrients from food alone. Lets do more. Add one a day 50 a complete multivitamin with 100 daily value of more than 15 key nutrients. One a day 50 . A bombshell announcement from the u. S. Inspector general from his office, an independent entity, will investigate wideranging allegations of misconduct related to the fbis probe into Hillary Clintons emails. According to the Inspector General, including allegations the Justice Department and fbi employees improperly disclosed nonpublic information perhaps at the center of this investigation are the actions of fbi director james comey, specifically his decision to hold a press conference in july recommending no charges for clinton while castigating at length her conduct, particularly for being extremely careless. Comeys now infamous letter to congress on october 28 saying he was looking into new emails discovered on a laptop shared by clinton aide huma abedin and her husband anthony weiner. Then he sent a letter two days before the election to congress saying nothing new has been found. In a Statement Today comey said i am grateful to the department of justices ig for taking on this review. Everyone will benefit from thoughtful evaluation and transparency regarding this matter. Now this investigation comes on the context of two things. One, the mounting evidence that comeys letter politically damaged clinton quite a bit and did it two weeks before the election. As princeton neuroscientist sam wang pointed out, opinions swung toward trump by four Percentage Points and about half of this was a lasting change and two, bbc reporting the fbi was part of a joint task force formed last april investigating allegations the russians may have sent money to mr. Trumps organization or Election Campaign something that, rightly, never leaked during the campaign. Joining me now, Matthew Miller former aide to attorney general eric holder, former Justice Department spokesperson. Your reaction to the announcement from the ig today . Im glad theyre doing it. I in a lot of ways wish they would have done it back in july. One of the things hindsight is always twen20 20, in july cos press conference that kicked off the series of events leading to the october letter, that press conference was inappropriate, it violated several written department of justice rules and had the Inspector General opened this type of investigation back in july and started to look at comeys conduct then whether it might have given him pause before he sent that letter in october. That said, its im glad hes looking at it now if nothing else, hopefully what comes of this is when he makes his findings, future fbi directors, attorneys general, others in the Justice Department know they can not behave the way comey did over the last six months. You were vocal in your we had you on the show the day of the press conference and you were vocal in saying it violated rules, procedure and norms in terms of when an investigation is closed without a finding that youll indict, thats what you do. You dont write an oped about how you think the person at issue was conducting themselves. Right. You just be quiet. Thats your job and fbi agents and prosecutors are always trained to do that and director comey has come out and said well, this was a special case and he said that again in october but these rules that are supposed to prohibit you from talking are designed for special cases. No one cares if you just close an investigation down quietly of lowprofe cases. Its written for tse big important cases and you hear comey y well i would have been criticized one way or the other and he especially said that to fbi employees after the october letter. You know, your job in these positions is to make the hard calls and if you get criticized, so what . Thats what comes with the territory. Theres another sort of theres a related issue and one that you and i have spoken about before and one that i was exorcized about just before the election which is not just specifically comeys conduct but the leaks that appeared to be coming around the investigation. We dont know if they emanated from within the fbi but there were folks, Rudy Giuliani and then other folks on fox saying all sorts of things, an indictment is coming, this investigation, that investigation, they tried to shut down our investigation, do you think we can get to the bottom of what happened there . Does the office of the Inspector General have the ability to nail down what happened . So those types of certainly they have the authority to interview anyone inside the Justice Department they want to. They cant subpoena Rudy Giuliani and make him testify but they can talk to any fbi agent, any prosecutor but finding out who leaked that information is very hard to do even if you can show that an fbi agent talked to a reporter at a given time because you subpoenaed the fbi agents phone records. You dont know what theyll talk about. So theyd have a hard time proving that. Youre right its clear there was something deeply wrong inside the fbi both with comeys behavior and the leaks coming out. Honestly its one of the reasons why Going Forward the fbi is continuing to probe donald trump over his ties with russia, purported ties with russia, we know thats been reported a number of times and its hard to have confidence that the fbi after you saw how they leaked time after time about clinton and now that comey is under investigation how they can fairly investigate trump with all this swirling around them. Matthew miller, thanks for joining us, appreciate it. Coming up, republicans stage an overnight offensive to start the repeal of obamacare. Will it work . I will ask senator Bernie Sanders ahead. Up to 30 million americans will lose their health care with many thousands dying as a result. Because you have no Health Insurance and you cant go to a doctor or a hospital, you die. People would ask me in Different Countries that we traveled, what is your nationality and i would always answer hispanic. So when i got my ancestry dna results it was a shocker. Im from all nations. It puts a hunger in your heart to want to know more. Buried in the avalanche of news to cover was a Significant Development on what is most certainly the biggest policy fight currently brewing in washington the on going effort to repeal the Affordable Care act. During his long awaited press conference, president elect trump had this to say. Were going to be submitting as soon as our secretary is approved, almost simultaneously, shortly thereafter, a plan. It will be repeal and replace. It will be essentially simultaneously. It will be various segments you understand but will mostly be on the same day oar the same week, probably the same day, could be the same our. Not only did president elect trump commit his administration to introducing their own replace plans, he wants a new plan implemented almost simultaneously, perhaps the same hour, to repeal of obamacare which is already under way. But that is much harder to pull off than it may look. One of the people fighting to make sure republicans dont succeed is vermont senator Bernie Sanders who joins me next. Its the Phillips Lady anyone ever have occasional constipation,diarrhea, gas or bloating . She does. She does. Help defend against those digestive issues. Take Phillips Colon Health probiotic caps daily with three types of good bacteria. 400 likes . Wow try Phillips Colon Health. And theyre absolutely right. They say that its hot. When really, its scorching. And while some may say the desert is desolate. We prefer secluded. What is the desert . Its absolutely what you need right now. Absolutely scottsdale. Last night while most people on the eastern sea board were asleep, members of the congress were voting. Republicans passed a budget resolution to begin the process of repealing the Affordable Care act. Along the way, Senate Democrats forced them to take a series of roll call votes on amendment after amendment designed to get their opponents on the record opposing widely popular features of the aca and to that extent their protest work. One by one, republica voted on the record to repeal some of the most popular provisions of the Affordable Care act, provisions they previously vowed not to do away with, things like being able to stay on your parents insurance until youre 26, preexisting condition coverage, preserving funding for rural hospitals. The senate voted down other popular provisions like an amendment that would protect access to Birth Control and preventative access for women and another that protected the childrens Health Insurance program. They even killed an amendment aimed at reducing the cost of prescription drugs. It had enough republican support to pass but died because too Many Democrats defected. In the end, the budget resolution paving the way for the repeal of obamacare passed 5148 without a single democratic vote and only one republican, rand paul, abstaining. All this sets up for whats ahead. One of the people who will be elbow deep in that fight, senator Bernie Sanders. Senator, can you explain to me what last night was about . My understanding is this is them setting up a budget process so they can do this without having them clear the filibuster and go through whats known as reconciliation . Exactly. This is the this is precursor for them to come back in a certain period of time and then repeal complete ly the Affordable Care act and the point that many of us made last ght, doing that, repealing the Affordable Care act without having any alternative would be a disaster for working families and the middleclass. What that will mean is that 20 million plus people will lose their Health Insurance. They will now have the option of privatizing medicare, making it to a voucher program, devastating cuts in medicaid which will impact not only low income families but middle income families who use medicaid to pay nursing home care for their parents and, by the way, it will raise the bryce of prescription drugs for senior citizens. On top of all that, repealing the Affordable Care act will provide a 300 billion tax break for the top 2 . One of the things john haarwood wrote about that people dont recognize how much of the actual act is funded by taxes on the rich and those will be repealed under any repeal plan. Heres my question for you. Democrats learned the hard way how difficult it is to wade into this policy area with a lot of different vested interests, a lot of peoples lives on the line, a lot of fear about change. They learned, we watched, how difficult it was to put that thing together. Do the same political laws of gravity operate here against the republicans . If they start taking away poor childrens health, young people on their parents, are they going to start running into walls of opposition . Well, chris, i dont think it works quite like that because the democrats had a different goal. What many of us believe is that we should guarantee health care to all people like every other major country on earth and how you get there and do in the a Cost Effective way and how you take on the Insurance Companies and the drug companies, thats tough stuff but that is not where the republicans are coming from. Thats not their goal at all. In fact, their goal is to protect the interest of the Insurance Industry and the pharmaceutical industry. So if it happens that many millions more people lose their Health Insurance, well, those are by and large poor people, they dont vote or if they do vote theyre not going to vote for republicans. Not a great concern. Theyre not going to make as Many Campaign contributions. Children depth vote, whats there to worry about . So you think this . Its interesting, ive been tracking the votes and one of the things weve seen is dean heller, a kind of key vote. This is a small majority, they only have three votes they can lose and some amendments theyve lost dean heller, the republican from nevada, hes up in two years in a state Hillary Clinton won, collins has defected. You dont think they start saying were going to kick 25yearolds off their insurance and you might be banned for preexisting condition that theres not hell to pay when they go home for recess . Yes, i think some of them are beginning to catch on that the problem might be more complicated than just saying we are repealing Affordable Care act, wow, arent we great. Then it will occur to some of them that when 20 or 30 Million People lose their Health Insurance and you raise the price of prescription drugs for seniors they may have to start answering some questions. It also strikes me, theyve made a bunch of promises that they cantll keep, right . So part of last night was exposing that a lot of popular things they said they wont touch theyre willing to vote against. The incoming president elect says well take care of everyone, no one will reduce their coverage and you look at the kinds of plans that say reptive the price who is going to run hhs would violate all of that. Can they square their promises with what they want to do . Chris, youre suggesting that there may be some contradictions in what is unfolding. Yeah. Well, we eagerly await mr. Trumps magical plan by which hes going to provide costeffective health care to every american. I eagerly await the presentation of that plan. And i eagerly await how theyre going to return insurance control to the states and maintain Patient Protection policies like preexisting conditions and making sure there is not a cap on what Insurance Companies can reimburse people fwhor ha for who have expensive medical needs. These guys have had six years to work on that plan. They detested the Affordable Care act from day one. Do you think they have been working on a plan that will improve the Affordable Care act . I think not. All right, senator Bernie Sanders, appreciate your time tonight. Thank you very much. Thank you. Still to come, more from that interview with Vice President voebd, hejoe biden. Plus, tonights thing 1 thing 2 starts right after this break. Just like the people who own them, every business is different. But every one of those businesses will need legal help as they age and grow. Whether it be help starting your business, vendor contracts or employment agreements. Legalzooms network of attorneys can help you every step of the way so you can focus on what you do. Well handle the legal stuff that comes up along the way. Legalzoom. Legal help is here. Yet up 90 fall short in getting key nutrients from food alone. Lets do more. Add one a day womens complete with key nutrients we may need. Plus it supports bone health with calcium and vitamin d. One a day womens in gummies and tablets. Cmohappy birthday i survived a heart attack. 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If you cant afford your medication, astra zeneca may be able to help. Thing 1 tonight, dr. Ben carson testified before the senate today as Donald Trumps nominee for secretary of housing and urban development. Dr. Carson is not asked the question that i would have asked, which is the following dr. Carson if i spent 30 years doing housing policy and showed up in your operating room, would you let me operate. But carson did face a number of questions and in the aftermath of the president s announcement with his conflicts of interest, carson got this question from senator Elizabeth Warren. Its not about your good faith. Thats not my concern. My concern is whether or not among the billions of dollars that you will be responsible for handing out in grants and loans, can you just assure us that not one dollar will go to benefit either the president elect or his family . Carsons answer is thing 2 in 60 seconds. So ben carson, nominee for secretary of housing and urban Development Asked today if he could assure the public that billions of dollars in hud money would never benefit the business interests of Real Estate Developer donald trump or trumps children. Carson answered with this. I will manage things in a way that benefits the american people. That is going to be the goal. To the best you understand that. If there happens to be an extraordinarily good program thats working for millions of people and it turns out that someone that youre ftargeting s going to gain 10 from it, am i going to say no, the rest of you americans cant have it . I think logic and common sense probably would be the best way. In other words, no guarantee from ben carson. Senator warren pointed out why in the case of a president elect who still refuses to release his tax returns and still refuses to divest carson cannot possibly answer her question. The problem is that you cant assure us that hud money not of 10 varietys the but of multimillion dollar varieties will not end up in the president elects pockets. He knows, he, the president elect, knows, what will benefit him and his family financially. But the public doesnt which means he can divert taxpayer money into his own cobs without anyone knowing about it. If youre told you have cancer, explore your Treatment Options with specialists who treat only cancer. Every stage. Ery day. At Cancer Treatment centers of america. Learn more at cancercenter. Com experts a heart attack doesnt or how healthy you look. No matter who you are, a heart attack can happen without warning. A bayer aspirin regimen can help prevent another heart attack. Be sure to talk to your doctor before you begin an aspirin regimen. Bayer aspirin. There are important rules and regulations that are on the books but whats also important is that standard thats set at the very top and thats why president obama did undertake the extraordinary step of essentially liquidating all his assets, plowing them into treasuries. That wasnt a Smart Financial decision because that coincided with a dramatic reduction in Interest Rates which hurt his return but ultimately that was a good decision for the country because there was no question about whether or not he had a financial motive to make a particular decision, he didnt. The white house today reiterating the stark difference between what president obama did coming into office and what president elect trump is doing coming into office. President obama divested his financial interests, as did hundreds of people who joined the administration, some of them with far, far more wealth than the president. And they did that, we should be clear, at great personal financial costs to themselves. Remember, president obama won an election in the middle of the financial meltdown of 2008, the markets in freefall. The day the president took office was reportedly the worst Inauguration Day in American History for stock prices is. The dow was just under 8,000 which would suggest anyone liquidating their assets at the time was likely taking a bath on them. Now on the eve of trumps ascendancy, a completely different economic environment. The dow is just under 20,000, the markets have been hitting record highs for months and yet even in such a beneficial atmosphere, donald trump still refuses to sell his holdings in his company. His lawyer explaining yesterday its just too great a financial sacrifice. Instead hes placing his business in a trust run by his sons. A measure so out of the norms of government ethics and the practices of generations of president s a tend people who serve them that the head of the nonpartisan and independent office of government ethics, a man named walter shaub, addressed the president elects remarks directly with a remarkably brave and earnest speech yesterday. You dont hear about ethics when things are going well. Youve been hearing a lot about ethics lately. I need to talk about ethics today because the plan the president has announced doesnt meet the standards that the best of his nominees are meeting and that every president in the past four decades has met. The idea of setting up a trust to hold his operating businesses adds nothing to the equation. This is not a blind trust, its not even close. I think politico called this a half blind trust but its not even halfway blind. The only thing it has in common with a blind trust is the label, trust. His sons are still running the business and, of course, he knows what he owns. His own attorney said today he cant unknow that he owns trump tower, the same is true of his other holdings. The idea of limiting direct communication about the business is holy inadequate. Thats not how a blind trust works. Theres not supposed to be any information at all, in developing the current plan, the president elect didnt have the benefit of oges guidance so, to be clear, oges primary recommendation is that he divest his conflicting assets. Nothing short of divestiture will resolve these conflicts. Appreciate that divestiture can be costly but the president elect would not be alone in making that sacrifice. Ive been involved in just about every president ial nomination in the past 10 years. Ive also been involved in the ethics review of president s, Vice President s, and most Top White House officials. Ive seen the sacrifices these individuals have had to make its important to understand that the president is now entering a world of public service, hes going to be asking his own appointees to make sacrifices, hes going to be asking our men and women in uniform to risk their lives in conflicts around the world. So, no, i dont think divestiture is too high a price to pay to be the president of the United States of america. In closing, i would like to add im happy to offer my assistance and the assistance of my staff if he decides to adjust his plan, thank you. Why pause a spontaneous moment . Cialis for daily use treats ed and the urinary symptoms of bph. Tell your doctor about your medicines, and ask if your heart is healthy enough for sex. Do not take cialis if you take nitrates for chest pain, or adempas® for pulmonary hypertension, as this may cause an unsafe drop in blood pressure. Do not drink alcohol in excess. 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The surprise ceremony capped the day spent talking to the news media, including a wideranging interview with our own Andrea Mitchell. Looking back now, president obama said that he could have defeated donald trump. Could joe biden have defeated donald trump. Oh, i dont know. I dont know. Im not going to speculate on that. In your heart of hearts, the criticism is there was a lack of an economic message, thats your ballpark. Pennsylvania, the rust belt, your home territory. Regrets . I have no regret in the sense that did i make the wrong decision. I made the right decision. And but do i regret that my point of view is not going to be reflected in the next administration because we have mr. Trump . Yeah, i do regret that. He says that he can get obamacare repealed and replaced on the same day in the same hour. What is he missing here . Im much older than you but remember the expression you would have when you passed around your yearbook to be signed and someone would say lots of luck in your senior year. Lots of luck in your senior year, mr. Trump. He lost the popular vote and but for 175,000 votes in three states it would be a different outcome so theres a thousand reass why you could attribute our candidates loss. It could be anything from the failure to speak to the constituency im giving credit for having a relationship with, working class and middleclass people, it could be what happened with the fbi. It could be a whole range of things but this is one election, andrea, where i dont think the issues really intruded. Id lay you 85 that you ask any informed person in the news media and say what was hillarys position on free college . Can you explain it . What was hillarys position on helping people with free child care . Those issues never got into the game. All the outrageous things that were said and done by the candidate sucked the oxygen out of the air so theres never a discussion about the economic issues. It never got there. It wasnt the presss fault. I mean if you get a chance to have to talk about whether or not a candidate groped somebody or whether or not the other candidates position is how they fund college tuition, whats going to get in the news is whether or not somebody gropes somebody and so we never got a discussion. One of the big issues is he said drain the swamp. Now he is yesterday he repeated that hes not going to release his taxes ever and says he doesnt need a blind trust. Hes going to just turn it over to the sons has he done enough . The office of government ethics, which is nonpartisan, said what he did is meaningless. No i dont think hes done enough and he may sink in the swamp. If you dont drain it, you sink in it. Its look youre one of the with all due respect, sir, one of the poorest people to ever emerge from public office. You were one of the poorest guys in the senate. You have a house, i dont know what other assets you have. He said that he could run his business as well as run the government the laws say he can. I dont doubt he could but you shouldnt run both. Are you going to be president or a businessman . You dont do both. You ran for the most coveted office in the world. The most Important Office in the world, the thing that the American Public looks to most for their security, opportunity, guarantees and focus on your job. Thats the job. Ive found it bizarre to talk about well i could have made it a 2 billion deal, victim done both, but i decided not to. As if youre doing the country a favor. I just think its look, this is a place where the public is going to decide whether or not the failure to divest, the failure to meet what were considered to be the basic minimum ethical standards of disclosure and if the public turns around and 50 say no problem or if 80 say this is a big problem, thats going to alter outcome. Remarkable interview with Andrea Mitchell with joe biden there and an amazing moment earlier today when the president offered him or gave him the medal of freedom. Its very rare you see in public life people genuinely surprised in public moments, unguarded and surprised. We got to see that today. That is all in for this evening. The Rachel Maddow show starts right now. Good evening rachel. Good evening, chris. Thanks for joining us at this hour. The youngest person in the United States senate is this guy. He has recently taken to wearing a scruffy little beard which makes him look a little bit older. Definitely makes him look beardyer. But beard or not, senator tom cotton of arkansas is young. Hes only 39 years old. Hes the youngest member of the United States senate and that is an institution that is not known for its youthful vigor. The oldest member of the u. S. Senate is more than twice his age. Dianne feinstein has lived two of tom cottons lifetimes already and then some. Shes 83 years old. And you know what . We should all